Sunday, September 13, 2015

The
plight of Syrian noncombatants has been known for several years now, ever since
there country was plunged into civil war. Yet only the recent photos of a small
ground Syrian refugee boy galvanize the world unity into paying attention to
this huge crisis that too few people know the story behind.

I
myself was unaware of exactly why so many Syrians were fleeing their country,
people who had jobs and stability no longer. War’s a complicated thing and it's
no less the case in Syria, so I was grateful to find this eloquent webcomic
that explained the situation simply:

Neil
Gaiman has given much of his time in the last year to making the plight of the Syrian refugees
known to the world. While I have seen many countries treat the refugees with
distain and fear, Gaiman rises above this to show us that such attitudes are
selfish in the face of such suffering on a massive scale as it taking place
right now:

Fear
will always be with us, as it’s natural to the human condition. Not every
refugee is a terrorist in disguise; far from it. Millions of people have been
driven from their homes, the scale of refugee movement not seen since the
Second World War. The world today seems indifferent to suffering, much more
inclined to bury their heads in Facebook or Instagram or whatever else makes
their world a rosy-tinted color. I have to ask myself as well, knowing my own
limitations and finances: what can I do?

Better
yet: what will I do?

September 8 – Night Lights!

Talk
about all-day anticipation!

After
work( and dinner, I might add )today,
I prepped our gear for later on this evening, because: Tonight was the night to
test our creations: buoys, that is, and we would end up spending about an hour
on the water overall tonight.

There
was a surprising amount of gear to bring, in addition to the boat, remote
control and buoys. Flashlights, the comfy porta-couch, a lantern, bug spray,
washcloth for drying the buoys after their immersion, digital camera plus
various other odds and ends. We packed all into the back of my lady's car and
drove down to the yacht pond at 8:30 PM, well after the sun had set and full
dark had settled on the shoreline.

As
expected, we were the only ones there and as the pond is unlit, we had to watch
our step as we made our way down the slight slope to the water’s edge, which is
bordered by an asphalt walkway. Unpacking everything, we laid out the buoys,
clipping them to the line and ensuring the lights were lit. We immersed them
one by one while ensuring the line wasn't tangled and that each floated
properly in the water.

The
problem of getting the line across the pond in the dark was quickly solved by
my girlfriend, who suggested the Haulin’
Trawler live up to its name by towing the bobbing line of buoys across to
the other side. Brilliant – this is how it looked:

Once
the line of buoys was secured, we had a grand old time sailing the fully-lit
Trawler around in the dark, as it looked magnificent. We had about a half an
hour of smooth sailing, then the winds off the ocean picked up, cooling
temperatures considerably.

Still,
it all worked wonderfully well - here's a brief video of the action:

I
should mention that for the last half-hour we had an unforeseen companion: a
young wayward duck! He followed our boat
around, quacking, likely unsure as to what exactly the shiny apparition of
light was, wandering around on his pond after hours. It was amusing in that we
couldn't see him at all and I had to
flash the occasional light onto the pond in order to locate the duck so as not
to run the boat into him. Silly bird!

All
in all, it was a very successful evening. My girlfriend and I had a ton of fun and
although we were somewhat chilled once everything was all packed up the car -
which by then was covered in dew - it's deftly something that were going to do
again, weather permitting.

I've
no idea if the duck will be there next time, though.

September 9 – Shiftings

Perfectionism?
Not my style – at least, not any more.

It’s
a form of ‘Perfectionist Poison’ to want to be in control of everything in your
life. While I’m not technically a control freak, I am more like such than I
care to admit, sometimes. Knowing what's going on in my life, what I need to do
in the short-term versus long-term, how I'm doing on my personal goals, small
things like grocery lists… all those and hundred other things are always on my
mind, for better or worse.

I
realize that I can't being in control of every single detail of my life; that's
not how it works. We do what we can with what comes our way, handling it with
grace were with heavy-handedness: whatever method suits our style at the time were
seems best for the situation.

For
me, I'm a planner. I look at facts, add data accumulated over years, things
I've accomplished and skills I've developed to help me deal with whatever gets
thrown my way. This can be both a blessing and a curse, in that carefully
assembled plans can be scattered to the winds when something completely
unexpected comes your way - often the case with life. As I've mentioned before,
I'm the sort of person who deals well with the big crises that come along but
it's bogged down in the details that consequently drive me bonkers week to
week. Not to mention it being a big part of my psyche, where I need to be
highly knowledgeable about both subjects that I talk of and conversant even in
those I don't regularly think about – my self-image is strange that way, but at
least I recognize that about myself and have worked to ensure that it's not a
pillar of my persona anymore.

I'm
getting better at balancing things, however. Having more points of stability in
my life now, I can better judge what's important in the short term or the long
and adjust accordingly. It sounds simple but you really have to look at the
attitude with which you deal with whatever gets tossed out you. Mine, for the
most part in the last year, has been positive and progressive towards the goals
that I want to achieve.

On
a similar note, I realized this week that I still had a recurring daily event
on my Google Calendar that has been redundant for nearly a year now: my
work-shift for my day job. I’d originally put it into the calendar to remind
myself of when I’d be working when there was lots of overtime early in 2015,
but now that I’m out of Invoices, it’s no longer necessary.

It’s
the first time in my working that I’ve ever had a weekly calendar that didn’t
list my work shifts on it… and it’s profoundly pleasing to me. At long last,
I’ve realized that I no longer have to check the calendar to plan my week,
wondering where I can fit things in depending on what I’m working each day – I know what I’ll be working now, until I decide to change things up.

It’s
a wonderful feeling, that.

September 10 – SciFi and Me

After
work today, I gave a presentation on science fiction for my writing group.

It’s
nights like this that make me glad I’m able to do what I do, writing-wise. I
was excited to give the presentation tonight, having prepared all week for it,
editing and revising my handout after giving a fair amount of thought as to
what I wanted to talk about.

By
that, I mean that I can give a presentation to a group of like-minded people( writers! )who not only want to hear what
I have to say, but add to the conversation as we go along.

Also,
tonight’s topic is near and dear to my heart, so that helped.

In
putting together the research for the presentation tonight, I came across a
curious discovery: nobody can agree on what exactly science fiction is, not
even acknowledged Masters of the genre. Here's a few of the quotations I used
from famous sci-fi authors:

It's
a curious thing, trying to define something that by its nature is so flexible
and often times deliberately obscure in its tenets. Science fiction is to me
the genre with the broadest canvas to work with, allowing authors to write
practically anything they wish in terms of fiction without any hue and cry
being raised by readers as to a story solidity in belonging to the genre.

In
any case, it was a splendid night, where I was able to present great amounts of
information, relevantly assembled, to a group of attentive writers. Quite a few
people expressed their gratitude to me afterwards for putting together such a
solid evening and I went home smiling, happy that once again I had not only
increase my own knowledge but that of others as well.

September 11 – Thrice Dazed

A
few problems reared their head today and well, it kinda made the day off move from pleasant to problematic and stinky. Unexpected expenses tend to do that to
me, especially when they throw my carefully-tended hopes of short-term
financial solvency all askew.

Bummer.

Still,
how one deals with problems is really the key to solving them. I did various
tasks all day in a frowning funk, then pulled myself out of it to meet a
co-worker for beers after work for a few hours. It’s strange how problems can
be: some are better for being shared, and others shrink to their proper,
not-so-bad-after-all size when you’re faced with either being a grumpy jerk
over beers or just letting things go after a proper day-long think-up.

For
the most part, I was over what was eating me by late afternoon. I did so by
reminding myself that what had to be done was necessary and that in the current
scheme of things, I wasn't any worse off.

That
sort of thinking is really what it takes. I was surprised, thinking about
things later in the evening, to realize that the one big unexpected problem had
attracted all sorts of other negativity along with it - all unintentional. The
phrase “misery loves company” applies to one's thoughts and feelings as readily
as any other situation and when I was feeling down today, all the other little
problems and failures in my life crowded in to keep the new problem company
without being asked.

Once
I realized that, I could look at things objectively and from there I could see
that while I wasn't exactly happy with how my finances would be over the next
few months, they were disastrous by any means. So I could get back to enjoying
my first-ever 3-day EDO weekend.

It’s
also important noting that 14 years ago today, the Twin Towers fell. Nobody
alive and aware of the event at the time will ever forget it.

Yet
now, almost a decade and a half later, this massive act of terrorism( despite the conspiracy theorists, I’m going
with Occam’s Razor on this one )remains a scar on North American psyche. A
reminder that the Western World is vulnerable, that there are monsters in the
world who will stop at nothing to ensure their ideology prevails, as I
mentioned last week with IS and the destruction of world cultural heritage
sites.

Evil
is out there, waiting for chances to strut its stuff, and it makes my own
problems dust in the wind by comparison.

September 12 – Un-a-Musing Visits

After
a pleasant patio breakfast with my lady, we parted ways to go about our day. I
managed to get a few things done that I hadn’t yesterday, due to my frustrated
state.

In
the afternoon, I got out of the house. I was determined to enjoy the fantastic
weather in some manner that didn’t involve me sweating like crazy or being
among a noisy crowd.

So
I chose to be in a park.

As
it happens, I still lugged a chair, laptop, jacket, water bottle and other
minor gear with me on a twenty-minute stroll to Beacon Hill Park. Shorts and
sandals were the order of the day, since it was so nice out, with hints of a
cool breeze from the ocean drifting now and then through the trees.

I
picked a perfect spot by the duck pond, out of the way of most people, right
next to the stream and shaded by a tree from the sun.

Nothing
came to mind. Nada.

You
can’t force the Muse to visit, if it’s not ready.

Once
I was back home, I spent a while looking deeper into how to use my copy of Scrivener to plot out the second half
of my book. It’s a flexible, capable program, but it’s not for novice users;
one has to work at eking the most out of its powerful tools, step by step.

I
think that’s got to be the key to making progress on Book 2: using Scrivener’s
plot tools. My book’s too complex to properly juggle it all in my head at this
point, and I think that’s what’s confusing my Muse, why I get so frustrated
trying to set down scene summaries of late.

September 13 – Visits Of Other Sorts

Today
was a double-header of fun!

My
girlfriend's parents were visiting the Island this weekend, so we met up with
them for breakfast this morning over at Willie’s Bakery – somewhat of a
misnomer, as the place is a fantastic restaurant with a small bakery inside.

It
turned out to be a lovely day today after all, with warnings of rain turning
out to be nothing more than that. We enjoyed our breakfast on the patio at
Willie's immensely, the food as always more than satisfying and quick to the
table.

After
that, we walked only a block down the street to see the Victoria International
Chalk Art Festival, in its third year here. Government Street was closed for
two blocks so that the artists could ply their chalky trade, some of them
having been up since the very early hours of the morning at work on the
cordoned-off roadway. Here's a few sample pictures:

You
can find the rest here - some really good art this year I
have to say!

Towards
noon, we decided to go and visit Oak Bay, possibly to drive around and see the
gardens. We actually ended up just walking around under the sunny blue skies,
poking our heads into the shops and seeing what we discovered. I ended up with
a boardgame that I hadn't known existed. It’s simple, 2-player and involves
castles – sweet! Here it is:

Lunch
was a lovely low-key affair at the Penny Farthing Pub, on the back patio that
has quickly become one of my favorite spots in Victoria. While the wind blew
leaves all around outside, my girlfriend, her parents and I were happily
ensconced in the protected( yet still
outdoors )patio, enjoying our lunch. Her parents are wonderful people and I
enjoy chatting with them whenever we see each other.

Then
it was home and blog writing time, with various household tasks interspersed as
per usual for Sunday evenings.

Except
for the fact that last-minute I was invited out to meet up with my sister’s
group of friends at the Beagle, which I hadn't done in probably six months or
more. Seeing as I hadn't had dinner yet, it made sense and so after another
hour of writing my blog, I headed out down the road for a quick 10-minute walk
down Cook St.

It
was good to just get out and relax with people I only know someone well, though
they're all really nice folks. As it turns out, one of them is a writer who is
determined to create her own fantasy trilogy, so we ended up chatting about
that for good part of my time there.

Once
I was back home after a pleasant few hours, I dove right into the blog and
finished it off in record time, well before my now rather-early 11pm bedtime –
that being the time when my eyes start drooping and I can’t do much more than
read a bit before dozing off.

It's been an odd week, I have to
say. Periods of stress interspersed among much longer periods of contentment
and bliss: that about sums it up. My shoulders and neck are far tenser than
they've been in some time and while I know it's an anomaly, it still
uncomfortable to think that it's pure stress that has done that to them so
easily. This coming week, I'll be focusing every day on things I can accomplish
and not dwelling on those factors that I can't do anything about in the short
term. I think that's a pretty healthy mode of thinking to take on for myself
this fall.